


Nightmarish Past

by comesitbymyfire (StrongerThanAnySword)



Category: Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Genre: Even the word of someone so loved and trusted as this, F/M, Some fears run too deep to be dispelled by a word
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-16
Updated: 2015-08-16
Packaged: 2018-04-15 01:23:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4587699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrongerThanAnySword/pseuds/comesitbymyfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A look at what may have happened the day Caine does not remember, a day which is on his mind every moment when he is near his Jupiter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nightmarish Past

Parade rest offered a chance to look around.

Everywhere, Entitled glided to and fro, investigating whatever teased their eyes, a disinterested interest identical on their faces.  They investigated anything pretty: banners and flags flying flashily in the breeze, the battalions of Skyjackers, and their own glittering ranks.

A hush was Caine's only sign that their employer had appeared.  He did not turn his head; his solemn statue-like stance a fixed point for the company behind him.  In front and to his right was only Stinger--their leader--and the parade-gap, and on the other side other Skyjackers, more faces so still they may have been skillfully carved stone, or in frozen stasis, or dead.  Caine's body gave an angry, protective thrum at the thought.  His company, his pack...even the passing thought that they may be endangered made his lip curl, just slightly, breaking his perfect artifice just for a second.  At that moment, a dark shadow passed over the pavement and seemed to sap the warmth of the midday sun right out of the rocks.

The buzzing, not quite faded, spiked into an insistent, bone-deep thrum.

No longer was he mildly irritated by the hot sun, one sure to pink his hide by the time everyone had dispersed.  No longer was he torn between anger and amusement at how close the Entitled got to them, tittering over their muscles, before fleeing at a mild walk.  No longer did he see anything at all, the world fading to his sense of smell, the sight of long, pale, spiderish fingers, and the sensation that had quickly taken over his body, bones rattling around in his skin.  The whole world was buzzing, his head was full of it, and his lips were curling back, showing his half-pointed teeth.  Without his permission--against his will--Caine's eyes shifted from their dead-ahead stare, just a fraction to the left...and into the icy stare of the Lord Balem Abrasax.

Caine saw red.

A surge, familiar in his muscles yet foreign here, so far away from the field of battle, sent him hurtling past Stinger, careening into the Entitled, found him shoving the screaming, soft-hide lord into the stones as people screamed and ranks broke.  Caine's arms were being ripped away and pinned behind his back even as he relished the tangy taste and scent of blood, roiling into his senses like a thunderstorm over the plains.  He snapped at empty air as his company dragged him back, murder rising from his chest to his throat, choking him akin to the way the Lord Balem's blood was currently choking him.  Caine's face was sticky and warm, cooling in the breeze, but he wanted to warm it again, bury it in Lord Balem's throat and keep ripping, tearing, glut himself with it, bathe in it, until every beat of his Entitled heart was futile and empty as his eyes--

Shoved to the ground, face ground into the sharp cobblestones, Caine was still struggling forward, teeth clacking and gnashing as he wormed an inch or so closer to the face of Lord Balem, also on the ground, mere feet away.  Caine wrenched his head up to look, to better judge the distance, and his next look at the Entitled had him gasping, choking on the blood coating his throat like he was trying to expel it onto the street.  Dark hair, long and spilling onto the stones; the glittering courtly clothes replaced by plain black spacewear; warm brown eyes deathly shut, a sheen of sweat beginning to coat her pale, lifeless face...

Caine's mouth was moving, contorting as his throat finally did _something,_ screamed for Jupiter, begged her to be alive as he struggled onto his knees and tried to drag his captors forward, desperate to take her into his arms, cradle her, force her blood to stay behind her too-fragile skin.  Someone was calling him--Stinger?--but he paid no mind, tears rolling down his cheeks only to bog down in the bloody mire smeared across his mouth before diving off his chin, stained red.  Caine could feel his shoulders screaming, warning of dislocation, but he just struggled harder, watching the pulse in her throat flutter weakly under ruined skin--

"CAINE!"

Jerking forward, up, Caine panted, eyes open wide and wild and stinging in the darkness.  Body salt-crusted and sweaty, sheets twisted and tangled around his legs and arms, he took a moment to understand, eyes whirling around the room, searching for danger and a darkness unrelated to the absence of light, chest heaving.  His stomach turned at the remembered taste of liquid iron in his mouth and he coughed, swallowing, trying to convince himself it was not there.

"Caine?"

A gentle, cool hand on Caine's hot shoulder had him jumping, slowly and with dread turning to look at a very concerned...

"Jupiter," he murmured, the breath and fight leaving his body with the exhale of her name.  He dropped his head to his hands, leaning forward as if to curl into a ball, shifting enough that her hand left his shoulder, uncertain.  Good.  He felt the urge to run, to flee, get as far away from her as he could, before his dreams became reality and he truly did hurt her...or worse.

But then came a shifting of the bed, and for a moment he hoped she was running and prayed that she wouldn't, before the gentle softness of her was wrapping around him as best as it could, and he was boneless in her arms.  He only shifted enough to wrap his arms around her in return, pulling her close and inhaling deeply.  Her scent, once a mission, had long since become the most calming, settling thing in the world, and she knew enough about it to shift closer, running a hand through his hair and murmuring soothingly.  

Jupiter, strong and sure as the planet for which she was named, held him and rocked, hands in his hair and murmuring soothingly a mixture of English and Russian.  Sometimes speaking, sometimes singing, she didn't let him go for the rest of the night, kissing his temple as he drifted off.  When Caine woke up the next morning, they had not shifted an inch, and Jupiter's song continued in the way her head rested on his, the deep and gentle breathing, and the mercifully strong beat of her heart next to his ear.

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be fluffy...Eh. Yes, a typical nightmare fic. It seems I just can't help myself. xD


End file.
